2017 Program

Event #16

Luciano Floridi

Thinking in networks

Thought is often a matter of the point of views from which we unconsciously set off, of the assumptions we never question, of premises so implicit they are invisible. To use an old but useful analogy, the eye is not able to see itself, but its perspective determines the way we see. The same is true for thought. Imagine if it were possible to work on our fundamental assumptions, influential and less evident, on our “Ur-Philosophie”, the deep philosophy that lies beneath thought. In which manner is digital communication influencing our Ur-Philosophie? How is our pre-critical manner of thinking changing? What happens to our most deep-seated ideas when the world shifts from a mechanistic mentality to one that has adapted to the concept of networks? Technology formats our way of thinking. And information technology does so even more radically.

is the OII Professor of Philosophy and Ethics of Information at the University of Oxford, where he is Director of the Digital Ethics Lab of the Oxford Internet Institute. He is also Faculty Fellow and Chair of the Alan Turing Institute’s Data Ethics research Group. He is Chairman of the Ethics Advisory Board of the European Medical Information Framework and member of the EU's Ethics Advisory Group on Ethical Dimensions of Data Protection, of the Royal Society and British Academy Working Group on Data Governance, and of Google Advisory Board on “the right to be forgotten”. His most recent book in Italian is published by Cortina: La Quarta Rivoluzione – Come l’infosfera sta trasformando il mondo (2017).